Voice of the People

It is time to do something about the traffic bottlenecks just west of Indiana 49 along Indian Boundary Road.

Chesterton’s population is expanding, and it appears that more travelers are stopping for gas or food from the Interstate. The stoplight at Indian Oak poses a big problem for drivers who are trying to make the left turn to return to the Interstate, and a big problem for local drivers who wish to cross Indiana 49 to the east side. Drivers fill up the left turn lane and spill over into the through lane, blocking cars who want to cross Indiana 49. Drivers coming north from Indian Oak or south from Burger King turn east onto Indian Boundary and block the east-west traffic. What a mess!

The town needs to address this problem before things get much worse. Travelers familiar with that bottleneck will cease stopping over in Chesterton just to avoid the hassle. Those of us who live off east Indian Boundary can avoid this mess by using Porter Ave., but we still need to get back to Indian Boundary. What can we expect traffic-wise when Pizza Hut opens? And when the lot surrounding it gets in new businesses?

I do hope the Town Council spends sufficient time and energy thinking about the impact of increased traffic when the new subdivisions are built. It's clear that not enough thinking went into the traffic planning when Indian Boundary west was growing new businesses so rapidly. I hope they have a plan that will alleviate the mess that we find on Indian Boundary.

Paula McHugh

Posted 11/23/2007